Integration of planar Gunn diodes and HEMTs for high-power MMIC oscillators

Papageorgiou, Vasileios (2014) Integration of planar Gunn diodes and HEMTs for high-power MMIC oscillators. PhD thesis, University of Glasgow.

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Printed Thesis Information: https://eleanor.lib.gla.ac.uk/record=b3086036

Abstract

This work has as main objective the integration of planar Gunn diodes and high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) on the same chip for the realisation of high-power oscillators in the millimeter-wave regime. By integrating the two devices, we can reinforce the high frequency oscillations generated by the diode using a transistor-based amplifier.
The integration of the planar Gunn diode and the pseudomorphic HEMT was initially attempted on a combined gallium arsenide (GaAs) wafer. In this approach, the active layers of the two devices were separated by a thick buffer layer. A second technique was examined afterwards where both devices were fabricated on the same wafer that included AlGaAs/InGaAs/GaAs heterostructures optimised for the fabrication of pHEMTs. The second approach demonstrated the successful implementation of both devices on the same substrate. Planar Gunn diodes with 1.3 μm anode-to-cathode separation (Lac) presented oscillations up to 87.6 GHz with a maximum power equal to -40 dBm. A new technique was developed for the fabrication of 70 nm long T-gates, improving the gain and the high frequency performance of the transistor. The pHEMT presented cut-off frequency (fT) equal to 90 GHz and 200 GHz maximum frequency of oscillation (fmax).
The same side-by-side approach was applied afterwards for the implementation of both devices on an indium phosphide (InP) HEMT wafer for the first time. Planar Gunn diodes with Lac equal to 1 μm generated oscillations up to 204 GHz with -7.1 dBm maximum power. The developed 70 nm T-gate technology was applied for the fabrication of HEMTs with fT equal to 220 GHz and fmax equal to 330 GHz.
In the end of this work, the two devices were combined in the same monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC), where the diode was connected to the transistor based amplifier. The amplifier demonstrated a very promising performance with 10 dB of stable gain at 43 GHz. However, imperfections of the material caused large variations at the current density of the devices. As a consequence, no signals were detected at the output of the complete MMIC oscillators.

Item Type: Thesis (PhD)
Qualification Level: Doctoral
Subjects: T Technology > TK Electrical engineering. Electronics Nuclear engineering
Colleges/Schools: College of Science and Engineering > School of Engineering > Electronics and Nanoscale Engineering
College of Science and Engineering > School of Engineering > James Watt Nanofabrication Centre
Supervisor's Name: Cumming, Professor David
Date of Award: 2014
Depositing User: Mr Vasileios Papageorgiou
Unique ID: glathesis:2014-5701
Copyright: Copyright of this thesis is held by the author.
Date Deposited: 06 Nov 2014 10:58
Last Modified: 06 Nov 2014 11:00
URI: https://theses.gla.ac.uk/id/eprint/5701

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